This Is How They Live
by fabricated fantasies
Summary: "It's really not the kind of living that anyone expected them to do, but it works for them, and who cares what other people think, anyway?" - Demelza/Romilda/Michael
1. first kiss

**a/n **Written for the 2012 Hogwarts Games, in the Pole Vault category, wherein every contestant had to write a 500 word drabble about their OT3. An OT3 is basically a One True Pairing (OTP), but with three people :)

My TrioGen OT3, and the one I decided to write, is Romilda/Demelza/Michael (that would be Vane/Robins/Corner) - I actually have never seen this before, so I would appreciate a mention if someone else writes one. This is pretty much a sequel to _all the truths we ever said_, as it relies a little on the canon of that fic, though this can be read as a stand alone.

I may do a continuation of this, but not a direct one - it'll probably just be bits and pieces of their lives together. I have a whole head canon for these three - four, counting Bridget (that's Colin and Demelza's daughter, in case it isn't clear later on) - and I'm pretty excited to have an excuse to flesh them out :D

Without further ado, may I present, _And __This Is How They Live._

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She's not really surprised at how they end up, because even if the three of them in love isn't entirely expected, they've always been closer than just friends should be - though 'just' can't _describe_ the feelings that burn through her with a simple touch or a smile, or the way they support her and mop away her tears as she cries.

(She always feels a little bit guilty for thoughts like this, because _Colin_ and _Bridget_ and a million what ifs, but Romilda kisses her sweet and slow while Michael holds baby Bridget in his arms, and she refuses to regret feeling happy again.)

The first year after the war is the hardest, because she's about to be a mother and her boyfriend _died_, and there's so many things she's lost that she's never getting back, but one look at Michael's face at his best friend's funeral reminds her that she's not the only one who has lost. She tries her hardest to pull it together, for baby Bridget's sake, but there are more days than she'd like to admit that she simply sinks down on Romilda's bed and cries until her heart doesn't hurt so much.

(She cries often, that first year, and Romilda buys her ten boxes of tissues for her birthday and tells her to make them last, and she laughs and laughs until her cheeks ache, and that's the moment that the king's horses start putting her together again.)

She uses up the last box of tissues when she pulls open Romilda's bedroom door on an ordinary Sunday afternoon and finds her and Michael tangled together in the yellow-green sheets, hands wound tightly together and lips almost blending, looking so in love that she wonders why she ever thought she had a chance with either of them.

And yet - and this is the only thing that gives her hope - there's a space between their lower bodies, a clear fissure where something is supposed to be, but isn't.

(It's her, she thinks; she's the missing piece, because they need her as much as she needs them, because the three of them were never supposed to be anything less than perfect lovers.)

"Are you going to leave me now?" she asks them, only once, when Bridget's asleep and she's busy pulling down the "Happy Birthday Bridget!" banner that Michael pinned to the wall that morning. They're sitting across from each other at the table, hands holding each other's and mugs of tea, and Millie chokes and almost spits her tea onto the tablecloth when she speaks.

"What gave you that idea?" Michael asks, looking so adorably confused that it reminds her of the Muggle Rice Cooker Incident from the previous week. For a Ravenclaw, he wears that expression a lot.

"Well, you guys are together now - you don't want to be held back by me and Bridget."

"Oh, Demy," Romilda laughs softly, and she almost falls off the ladder as they pull her down and hold her close, and yeah, this is definitely making her top five best nights.

("We love you," Romilda says later, and Michael's eyes are bright as he presses a kiss to her cheek.)

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**a/n **Please review, and don't favourite without reviewing! :)


	2. it's not easy to forget you

**a/n **for the next round of _pole vault_ (Hogwarts Games 2012), with a limit of 700 words and the prompt 'Let Me Go' by Christian Kane. I haven't used the prompt word for word, it's more a feeling, if you know what I mean :)

Also for the OT3 boot-camp on HPFC, with the prompt 'tears'.

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**it's not easy to forget you_  
_**

* * *

_it's so cold outside your arms__  
and we both know  
that you're not as strong as you think you are_

- Let Me Go, Christian Kane

* * *

You're teaching Bridget how to count when it all goes wrong again, and you've been doing so well these past few months that you hate yourself for giving into emotion yet again.

"Three!" she declares, and she looks up at you with her big brown eyes and you feel like it's three years ago and the world is ending all over again. It's been a while since you were hit so hard with this, this longing for Colin _alive_ and still forever in love with you, the kind of life you are almost certain you could have had if he had never lost his life to war.

"Mummy!" Bridget calls, clapping her hands and meeting your eyes again, and you run as if you're sixteen again and trying to find your boyfriend before it's too late to say goodbye. The floorboards creak beneath your feet as you dash through the hallway, throwing yourself through your unlocked bedroom door and onto your bed, unable to hold back tears any longer.

_She's not Colin_, you remind yourself, _she's not_, but your dead boyfriend's eyes are reflected in her face, and even after three years the feelings of hopelessness and loss threaten to overwhelm you.

The door opens with a creak that you ignore until Romilda sits down on the bed beside you.

"Want to talk about it?" she offers, used to dealing with this - with you - since the war ended, because she was the only person you allowed near you for a long time. You nod. "Was it Colin again?" she asks, never one to meander in conversation if something could be said straight out.

"_I love you_," you blurt, desperate to get this across, the message that it isn't her or Michael that's the problem. It's _you_, with your lost loves and dashed hopes and inability to let this go, because you feel so much that it consumes you with every breath, and feelings like those are hard to push away.

"Dem-" she starts, but you cut her off, reaching out to grab her wrist, finding comfort in the touch.

"I love you, and Michael, and our baby - because she's ours now, yours and mine and Michael's and Colin's. I don't, I don't know how," you manage to force out before her arms close around you, her perfume almost overpowering your grief-heightened senses.

"I know, Demy. Michael," her voice fades slightly, as if testing out in her mind what she wants to say. It's a concept that brings you slightly out of your spiralling thoughts, because Romilda is almost never at a loss for words. "Michael doesn't get it sometimes, because he's managed to push his grief aside, and it's hard for him to get that you haven't."

"You're not weak, Dem," Michael's low voice sounds from the doorway as if he is reading your thoughts, and you catch a flicker of darkness in his eyes before he smiles, lighting up his face in contrast to the kind of cynical blankness that it usually conveys. "Just a little touched in the head," he teases, smile transforming into a smirk that sits more naturally on his face.

"Not helping," Romilda throws out, though there's a tiny smile on her face like she's half-annoyed and half-amused, the way the two of them usually are around each other. You still aren't sure how they survived a year and a half without you as a mediator - you've broken up their various arguments more times than you can count.

"It's okay," you say, holding your hand out to Michael, who crosses the room to take both your hand and Romilda's. His fingers curl around yours, and you feel marginally better, having two of the three people you love most in the world beside you, because it doesn't matter that you don't always understand where they're coming from, or vice versa. It doesn't matter that they fight, or you have days where you don't want to get out of bed and face the world, or that you're sometimes scared that caring for Bridget will become too much and they'll leave you.

You love them, and they you, and sometimes that's all that counts.

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**Please review!**


	3. the thrills of domestic bliss

**a/n **for the next round of _pole vault_ (Hogwarts Games 2012), with a minimum of 1000 words; also for the OT3 bootcamp with the prompt 'temper'. A little bit of a change - third person perspective _and _Michael's POV. There's also been a massive time skip, though I will fill in the blanks later - for reference, Bridget is fifteen, making everyone else about thirty-two.

Enjoy!

warnings: a bit of light swearing, sexual references, usual warnings for femslash and polyamory apply.

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**the thrills of domesticated bliss**

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"Morning," Michael greets as Romilda enters the kitchen with bleary eyes, heading straight for the cup of tea waiting for her on the bench. He grins as she mumbles something at him without appearing to move her lips at all, raking one hand through her tangled mess of hair while picking up the cup with the other.

"Mum! Mum!" Bridget enters the kitchen at Demelza's heels, talking in the mile a minute way she always does, complete with boisterous gestures that he's pretty sure she picked up from Romilda. Maybe from Colin too, he adds mentally, though logically it wouldn't make sense for her to be anything like the dead father she never met.

"I said I'll think about it, Bridget, now be quiet," Demelza responds, sounding harassed, though the hands that rest on her round belly are soft and relaxed. He had woken up that morning to the musical sounds of her throwing up in the bathroom, so he supposes that her being annoyed is fairly normal. Actually, he has no idea if it's normal or not, since he wasn't around as much the first time, but all his research tells him that unless her mouth fills with blood or she starts killing people, the vomiting and the perpetually annoyed tone in her voice is pretty average. It doesn't sound fun, carrying someone around inside you, even if they're still small and don't have the ability to make sounds yet.

"What're you on about now, B?" Romilda speaks up, handing her half-empty cup to Demelza as she walls by, pulling toast from the cold box and waving her wand over it. She overshoots, as usual, and ends up with two handfuls of burnt bread, but she happily plonks already cut slices of cucumber onto it and tips half a small jar of mulberry jam over the top of everything, so he assumes she doesn't mind. He does make a mental note to pick up more jam later, though.

"Rachelle's having a party tomorrow before we go back to school, and also because Callum and Maisie told us they were together before disappearing over the holidays and we haven't had a chance to interrogate them yet, but Mum says I can't go because I promised to help out at the Home tomorrow. I really really want to go," she tells them adamantly in almost one breath, and he has to hide a smile as he turns away on the pretence of turning the kettle on again. She reminds him so much of Romilda, once she had softened a little and gotten over her crush on Harry, which he and Demelza still love to tease her about, complete with fake love potion containers lying in wait for her on her dresser on random occasions.

"The same Rachelle that I found you with in your bedroom, with the door locked?" Romilda asks, raising her eyebrow and looking clearly unimpressed, and he feels sorry for his daughter already. He can see how this will go.

"Er, yes?"

"Then no, you can't go," she responds with finality, clearly satisfied with having dealt with that so easily. "Michael, since when have I drunk chamomile tea? You know I hate it," she says, changing the subject with only a little annoyance in her voice, sounding mostly teasing and more than a tad exasperated at having so say the same thing for the sixth time in as many days. He doesn't reply, merely shrugging slightly at her retreating back, because he still can't get used to this new system she set up on one of her bored days. He doesn't say as much, though, because ever since the war he's preferred to conserve his words, a fact which often gets him in trouble with Romilda. She's the biggest talker of the three of them, and he the smallest, with Demelza as mediator for the fights that always crop up between them. He doesn't know what they would do without her, sometimes - he and Romilda would likely have self-destructed long ago if they hadn't been busy taking care of her, and later, falling in love with her.

"Love, can you bring me some more toast?" Demelza calls from the lounge room, and he can clearly picture her seated on their magically expanded couch, not bothering to try to get up again after her numerous failed attempts. He watches with a fond kind of half smile as Romilda rolls her eyes and snatches the whole loaf of bread and the rest of the jam off the counter on her way out of the kitchen.

"Daddy, please will you talk to Mama? I was just about to win Mum over when she jutted in, and I really want to go. Teddy promised to take me home after," she adds hastily, grinning hopefully at him with a twinkle in her eyes like she knows he'll give in soon enough. He will, of course he will, because he's never really been able to deny her anything since he walked out the door fourteen years ago and left her with her mothers for six months, though she doesn't remember it at all. He won't tell her, but he carries the guilt all the same.

"He did, did he?" he says, pulling a cup down from the nearest cupboard and filling it with cranberry juice, before handing it to her in the ritual they have done every morning of every summer since she left for Hogwarts the first time.

"He's a very nice boy, Daddy," she tells him seriously, brown eyes peeking out from behind the rim of the cup. "Please let me go? _Please_?"

"Yes-" he starts, cut off by her slightly muffled squeal. "If you promise to keep an eye on the Floo in case we need you to come home. And Teddy has to come inside when he drops you off," he adds to his very short list of conditions at the last moment, silently tacking a 'so we can interrogate him' to the end of it.

"Done and done and done!" she exclaims, darting up to kiss him on the cheek, spilling tea on his shirt in the process, before running up the stairs, probably to her room to Floo Rachelle. He reminds him not to go up there for a good ten minutes, because two fifteen year olds being excited about something is hazardous for his eardrums. He has the bill from St. Mungo's to prove it, though that was less about the screaming and more about Bridget tripping over and throwing her still lit wand at him. But still.

"M?" a voice calls out from the lounge room - Romilda this time, though he can hear Demelza's giggles providing the soundtrack to his day. He's glad she's smiling now, particularly after all the tissues she used when she first got pregnant, though this one was actually planned, and she wasn't sixteen and alone with a dead boyfriend buried on a battlefield.

Heading into their living space, meaning to tell them about Bridget's new rules for going out, he isn't surprised at what he sees - Demy lying down with her feet in Romilda's lap, who looks like she wants to hate the fact that she's done nothing for ten minutes except listen to their girlfriend read, though she can't quite keep the smile off her face.

"'I'll keep you safe,' the prince promised, and because he-'"

"-was pretty sexy, much like the devastatingly gorgeous man who just walked into the room," Romilda interrupts the story-telling, throwing a smile over to him and holding out her arm. He crosses the floor to sit beside her, perching awkwardly on the arm rest and tangling their fingers together comfortably.

"Millie, love, I don't really want our child to appreciate Michael in the same way we do," Demelza chides her, sounding a lot less agitated than she did twenty-minutes ago, clearly better for spending time alone with Romilda. Despite being the most liable to fierce tempers and mood swings, there isn't anyone better to calm Demelza down than Romilda, he thinks, settling back in his make-shift chair to lean in a somewhat comfortable position against the wall.

"Eurk, why did you have to say that, D?" Romilda responds with a laugh, wrinkling her nose and turning to hide her face in his tea-splattered shirt. "Ew, M, what the fuck is this?"

"Tea," he tells her bluntly, speaking for the first time since entering the room. "Courtesy of your daughter."

"Why is she _my_ daughter when she's doing things like that? 'Melza technically gave birth to her - I just held her hand. As did you, may I point out," she adds, looking disgruntled as she tries to wipe off the tea with the clean bits of his shirt without ruining her makeup. He locks eyes with Demelza across the top of her head, and she smiles with such a fondness in her eyes that he has to resist the urge to tackle the both of them to the ground and kiss them breathless. He only resists because he figures that Bridget wouldn't appreciate it, should she ever come down the stairs.

"I hate to say it, love, but she's more like you and Colin than either of us," Demelza counters, waving her left hand briefly to encompass Michael in the 'us'. He shares another smile with her, this one filled with pride, because no matter how long it has been since he died, he knows how hard it is for her to speak so casually of him.

He's not jealous of Colin's place in her heart, most days, because despite sharing a daughter and first kisses and a million photographs of the two of them that Demelza refuses to throw away - despite all the history they share, he knows she loves him. She tells him, often, in little things; smiles and kisses when he comes home, and the way she cuts up the carrots in the shape of flowers simply because his own mum taught him how to do it, and she knows how much he misses her still.

"If by 'like me', you mean 'beautiful and funny', then I guess I agree," Romilda says with a smile, and he decides he can tell them about Bridget's newfound freedom later. He wants to enjoy this quiet time with them, listening to them banter holding Romilda's hand.

"You are beautiful," Demelza admits, pressing a kiss to their girlfriend's cheek directing her soft smile to encompass them both.

"It's true - though I must admit, you are _almost _equal in-" she teases, and he gives up on all his half-formed plans, kissing her thoroughly until she stops talking, and with a whispered "May I?" he continues to do things with the both of them that his daughter wouldn't appreciate at all.

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**Please review!**


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